Clear As Mud
by HC0
Summary: --"Your very first party?" --"Do funerals count?" She was three years old and she was already grown up.


**Disclaimer: **_**Wicked**_** and all its accompanying everythings are the creation and property of Gregory Maguire. **

* * *

She was three years old and already grown up.

Melena's funeral was held with great pomp and circumstance, as befitted the governor's wife. There were hundreds in attendance, standing in black, glancing sadly at the casket and the nurse holding the tiny deformed infant. Solemn murmurs filled the air. Frex, in fine mourning, greeted and thanked people as they offered consolation.

Nobody gave much thought to Elphaba.

From the moment that her father had stalked up to her and informed her that her baby sister was ruined and her mother was dead_--all_ _because of her_—and had looked at her with that disgusted gaze, she'd been in agony. She had nobody now: they wouldn't let her see the baby ("What, and hurt her even more?"); her father acted as though she wasn't there; everyone else followed suit. And her mother, dizzy and drunk but also loving when nobody else was, who had called her Fabala, hugged her, once kissed her, always acted as though the little girl meant something…she was dead, dead and gone. Elphaba knew why, because everybody did and they said it: _All because of Elphaba_. More than anything she wanted to tell her mother that she was sorry, sorry for what she'd done to her and to the baby—Nessarose, her name was. But her mother was in the Other Land, where there was no place for bad people, and even this young Elphaba knew that what she'd done was bad beyond words. "God?" she'd said, once, but there was no answer, and she knew that even he'd been disgusted and deserted her.

Nobody had bothered to take care of her over the last few days, but this morning Elphaba had managed to give herself a bath and find a pretty dress to wear. She wasn't quite sure how to manage the hair, but it didn't look too bad. She looked like a good girl should, something she'd always tried to do, green or no. She'd avoided being trampled in the funeral procession and had followed everybody into the big room where her mother's body was in that big, imposing box. After an hour, she'd mustered the nerve to go look—and there was Melena, dead. Elphaba's nerve had failed her then, and she'd run to the farthest corner of the room, where she now sat, crying softly.

And no one looked. The nurse circulated, showing little Nessarose off for pity's sake, so tragically beautiful. Frex did publicity; other people did their duties. Food and drink. It was like a party. It _was_ a party. Her mama was dead and these people were having a party! She'd always hated parties; this cemented it. People were having fun because her mama was gone forever.

Another hour passed before it was announced that the service was about to start, and everybody found a seat. Elphaba stayed hidden in her corner.

Person after person stood up to give eulogies. They spoke of how wonderful Melena had been, what a good wife and how kind and charitable and beautiful. Seven people came and went, and Elphaba listened to every word of it, searching for some trace of the Melena that _she_ had known. But nobody mentioned her. _Say who she was! _Elphaba begged them in her mind. _She wasn't that lady, she was my mama. My mama! _"Mama," she whimpered, not meaning to, and everyone looked over to see who'd made the sound.

Elphaba looked back at them, red-rimmed eyes pleading for something, anything. There was hardly a person there that wasn't moved, but they could not be moved. The governor was still in charge, and it was well known that he didn't tolerate any allowances for his daughter, whom he barely acknowledged. So while some had pitied, they'd generally turned away and ignored. They did this now.

Elphaba couldn't believe what she was seeing. Had the whole world gone against her?

Her father got up and picked her up by the elbows. "What are you doing here?" he hissed.

His hands were too tight, but they didn't hurt half as much as the monster in her chest, clawing its way up her throat. "Goodbye," she whispered tearfully. "I wanted to tell Mama—"

"She can't hear you," Frex snapped. "She's dead. And you know why."

Elphaba nodded frantically. "I'm sorry," she sobbed. "Papa, I didn't mean to, I'm sorry! I miss her."

"And Nessa, who will never know her?"

"I'm sorry! I didn't want to, please, can you bring her back." She knew it was irrational, but she couldn't help what she was saying now, it was just pouring out like the tears.

Frex shook her again, and a man sitting in the back got up. "Sir?" he said timidly. "She's just a little girl, perhaps—"

"Sit down or your taxes will be so high—" Frex didn't have time to finish the threat before the man was back in his seat. He turned his attention back to his daughter. "I don't know how you even found your way here," he told her in a harsh whisper, "but you are going to leave now. You have no place here. Go." He pushed her toward the door.

"I wanted to say goodbye!" Elphaba told him, choking. "I miss her, and they don't know her."

"You've said your goodbyes. I don't want you here when it's all your little green fault." He started to pull her.

"Mama!" she screamed. "Mama! Mama…" Then, as if realizing the futility, she broke loose and went for the exit. She slipped and crashed on the marble; everyone winced. But she got up and continued on out the door, and the funeral continued.

Outside, she ran away, away, away as far as she could go. She tripped again on the sidewalk, skinning her hands and knees. She brushed away as much of the gravel and blood as she could—salt ran into the scrapes and it stung—and kept on running. The tears blurred her vision and she kept on sliding, at one point rolling all the way down a hill, luckily missing the larger rocks, into a mud puddle.

It was the mud puddle that did it. As she sat on the ground trying to clean herself, she realized where she stood in the grand scheme of things: One little girl that had just been literally kicked out of her mother's funeral by her own father for wanting to say goodbye. She was sweaty, there was a burr in her hair, and she was full of mud and blood and tears, which wasn't affecting anybody else's life. She wasn't attached to anything, and nothing was attached to her. She was her own person.

She didn't run after that.

Elphaba kept on walking, keeping an eye out for sticks that would trip her. She didn't know where to go, and she didn't care. So she moved aimlessly until she saw what looked like a barn in the distance. If that barn was not abandoned, there was a farm. And on a farm there were people, but there were also animals. She began to run again, but more carefully this time, and she reached the farm without incident.

She slipped under the fence and walked through the open door of the barn to find horses looking out at her. Elphaba stopped for a moment to catch her breath and to breathe in the big, comforting smell of horses. The she went down the stalls, looking and petting and talking and giving the occasional peck on the soft muzzle.

In one big stall there stood a foal, little and gangly and fuzzy, teetering on his long legs. He put his nose over the door and snuffled into Elphaba's face, and for the first time in a week she allowed herself to smile. "Hello," she said.

He gave a little whinny—Hello! it said—and his mother turned around to see what had gotten her son's attention. She looked at Elphaba—little green apple of a girl—and seemed amused by her child's new friend. She snorted and nuzzled the little foal's back.

All at once the hard lump rose up again in Elphaba's throat. _Even horses have mothers! _She wanted to run away, but instead she lifted the latch on the door and walked inside. "I'm Elphaba," she said to both of them. "I'll try not to hurt you."

Even if she was a horse mother, the mare was a mother, and equine or not this girl needed one. She lipped the girl's hair, softly, and Elphaba burst into fresh tears. The first affectionate touch in how long? "I didn't mean to do it," she gasped. The mare settled herself on the straw and whickered. All the feelings that had been welling up in Elphaba for her entire three years exploded out of her then. "It's not fair!" she cried, collapsing against the horse's warm side and wrapping her arms around its neck. "Why?" Why me, why the green, why the world.

The mare licked her, forehead to nape, as though cleaning off a foal. The motion was soothing to Elphaba, and in time she cried herself to sleep.

* * *

For no known reason, the farmer had always been known to his friends as Blue. But Blue turned white when he looked over the stall door and saw a toddler lying so close to his mare's hoofs. _Bloody hell she's killed her!_ he thought frantically. Chessy would never intentionally harm anybody, but she was a big animal, and stupid, and she had her foal to protect. The gate was unlatched, the girl must have walked in.

But just as he was about to have a complete breakdown, the girl breathed, and so Blue did too. He opened the door and knelt beside her. "Hello?" he said.

Her eyes flew open. She glanced around, as if trying to remember where she was. Then her eyes filled with some emotion—he couldn't describe it, but it was nothing he'd ever thought he could see or would have wanted to see in a child so young—three or four at most. She scrambled away from him.

"I won't hurt you," he said. "My horses didn't."

She stopped and eyed him warily. "They're your horses?"

He smiled and nodded.

She gave a small, shy smile back. "I like them."

"Do you really? Well, so do I. But it's so late, your mother must be so worried about you."

The smile vanished. "She's dead."

Big mistake, thought Blue, hurting for her. "Oh. I'm so sorry about that. Well, then, somebody—"

"My father doesn't like me," she told him. "And nobody else cares."

"Well, I'm sure that they want to know where you are," said Blue. He liked kids, but he sure didn't want one of his own just yet. "What's your name?"

She debated for a moment. "Elphaba," she finally said. "Elphaba Thropp."

Thropp! The governor's daughter that he couldn't stand; the one who'd been orphaned. Oh, dear. "Look, Elphaba, you have to go back."

"Why?"

"You just do. There's no place like home, trust me."

Blue's neighbor was driving up near Colwen Grounds, so Blue deposited the girl with him. Elphaba refused to make any conversation, and after a few tries the man gave up. There was silence until they reached the gates of Colwen Grounds.

"Are you okay here?" he said. "No need to walk you up?"

She laughed, a bitter one. "I'll be fine. Goodnight." She jumped down and walked off slowly, dragging her feet towards the house.

Elphaba heard no cry of relief when she walked through the back door, covered in mud. Nobody had really noticed her absence, but she didn't care too much. She went into the kitchen and climbed onto the counter to reach the plates.

She made herself a small supper, took a bath to clean the muck off, and put on a nightgown. She did not say her prayers before climbing into bed, because as far as she was concerned the world was beyond all hope. She tucked herself in and almost immediately fell asleep.

She was three years old and already grown up.

THE END

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End file.
